Skip to main content

Forza Motorsport 6: Apex Review - Part 3

FORZA MOTORSPORT 6: APEX

Favorite Gameplay Component
My favorite gameplay component of Forza Motorsport 6: Apex is altering and tailoring my driving style to the conditions of the race. If ever I attempt to reach top-speed on a wet track such as Brands Hatch United Kingdom, the vehicle spins off track and out of control.
That’s a challenge for me, as my strategy isn’t so much into drifting, but in staying as straight as possible, so that I can reach over to 200 km/h -- keeping within a controllable limit.
Another method of mine I had to retire -- and this is coming from the likes of Asphalt 6: Airborne and Mario Kart Double Dash -- which is ramming into players. I quickly found out in a vehicle simulator under the laws of natural physics, this reduces my speed on impact.
There are also frequent bottlenecks at turning points in the track; luckily I can use my best strategy and I find this to be the best opportunity to strategically slip past other cars when an opening presents itself.

Least Favorite Component - and How I Would Change It

After pitting the player against the CPU during the tutorial race, the first real Drivatar circuit race can be a rough shake for first-time vehicle sim racers.
Coming in from Gameloft’s Asphalt franchise, where nitro boosts secure you a first place trophy and physics have little role, it was an entire overhaul of my expectations.
Forza Motorsport 6 has an option to reduce the difficulty of the race and subsequently the Drivatar type, but what I found in some races is that it can actually becomes more difficult. The bottlenecks are larger, braking periods are longer -- and before you know it, you find yourself dodging vehicles, trying to not to slam into them or fly off-track, over actually racing against them.
I would change this by allowing the player to choose the type of Drivatar they race -- viewing player stats and selecting competition accordingly; the XP and medal system can stick, where the lower the difficulty, the less the player earns.
There is also an issue I’ve encountered where often times there is one Drivatar that will race at a significantly higher speed than all of the others -- not unbeatable, but they may push ahead at least 10-15 seconds ahead of the 2nd place driver.
During one race, I was about 2 seconds behind 2nd place, but at least 10 seconds behind first and that to me seems unbalanced; not uncommon in racing games, but the simplest way to beat that Drivatar is to upgrade or purchase a better vehicle.
I would solve this by awarding players at least ⅓ of the racing points at start of the game, needed to purchase a more powerful entry-level vehicle. That way earning the other near 70% is still remains challenging, but the player has more of an incentive to race and lose a few more times, for the chance of purchasing a better vehicle.
In this case, this allows the player not only to become better acquainted to the style of the game, but they can also in turn amass enough points to upgrade their racecar or purchase another vehicle for future races and not be miles behind the other cars in terms of performance, which is something that may  frustrate new players.

In Conclusion

In Forza Motorsport 6: Apex, the player races to earn medals and race points they can use to purchase more powerful vehicles. There is a broad range of tracks (28 in-game, 2 DLC) that can be unlocked by placing at 6th or higher to advance to the next race.
Dynamic markers guide the player on the best route -- blue when you can accelerate, orange when you should slow down and red to indicate when to hit the brakes -- a bottleneck is coming.
In Forza Motorsport 6, may the best racer win. To be the best in this game it’s not really down to serendipitous chance or pure luck, but refined skill that comes from a lot of racing and tweaking.
The faster your vehicle and the more skilled a driver you are, the higher you'll rank in the race and worldwide. It’s something that newcomers can quickly adjust to -- but they must put it all into practice with quick reaction and opportune timing during the race to progress.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Level Design in God of War (Part 1)

Becoming the God of War God of War is one of the most-critically acclaimed franchises to ever hit the Playstation market. In this pipeline deconstruction, I will refer to elements of the series as a whole. Dominus the main character in concept, needed to be summed up in a single word -- wrath . Covered in the ash of his wife and child, the character is a demigod who seeks revenge on the gods who betrayed him. Once the artists stripped away his armor and shield, the character’s true raw, animalistic side was exposed. Tall with upper-body musculature, covered in ashes and hunched over with his signature Blades of Chaos, Dominus was a force to be reckoned with. Dominus set the stage for the today’s Playstation mascot -- Kratos. Level Design Mood and exploration is a staple part of level design in God of War . Areas that are more open are also relatively barren; while many objects are placed around smaller areas like rooms. I think this encourages the player’s sense o...
Post a Comment
Read more

Time Manipulation in Game Design

Time Manipulation in Games Introduction The gameplay mechanic that I wish I had come up with first, is Time Manipulation. This is includes the concept of time dilation and the reversal of time in games. Implementing the Manipulation of Time Time manipulation is a robust mechanic. It involves non-exploitable time manipulation, with the goal of being fast and smooth, while not computationally-taxing on memory or hardware resources. The best way to implement this mechanic can be seen in Braid - an indie platform and puzzle game, developed by Number None, Inc. In this game, the world state is recorded for every frame, where the data is stored and compressed. With the recorded frames, any changing entities are extracted and mixed into the final state, which can be manipulated or rewound by the player. The player’s position is recorded and other properties such as color and rotation are stored as an integer that can be reconstructed, along with time information taken fro...
Post a Comment
Read more

Most Difficult Parts in Heavy Rain

Under Pressure In my experience, the most difficult button combination sequence in the game is when Norman Jayden must bring in a suspect for questioning, who goes by the name of Mad Jack. Jackson is said to have sold a used car to the Origami Killer and presumably has information on the killer identity or alias. When Jayden finds traces of human blood and orchid pollen, he tries to arrest Jack on the spot. He resists the arrest and goes to Kill Jayden — which he can if the player is not quick enough during the intense fight sequence. If Jayden survives the attack and beats Mad Jack, he concedes and Jayden proceeds with the arrest. It’s then Jayden’s nose begins to bleed, his eyes begin twitching and his hands start shaking uncontrollably in the middle of the arrest. To resist feeding his addiction to a drug called triptocaine, the player must hold down a series of buttons to stop his hands from shaking and the weakness from his symptoms of withdrawal. If the playe...
Post a Comment
Read more